The New Recruit or How I Almost Got in a Fight with a Sexist Jerk

EDIT: Due to this post getting way more attention than I expected, I feel the need to make a few clarifications.
1) This was a one time event that I felt like talking about. A one time event. I write 1500 words about something when I find the topic interesting. It doesn’t mean it’s in the end of the world.
2) After reading the discussion surrounding this post on my blog and on other blogs, I realized that I’m really not being fair to my GM here. Yes, I pointed out his faux pas in the story. Leaving it out would have ended my tale rather abruptly. I (stupidly) wanted to keep explanations brief and simple and focus on myself and on my part in the story. I (again stupidly) left out everything else going on in the guild as well as how he scolded our little troublemaker and patiently listening to my complaining. He also let me get away with this blog post which definitely earns him props. (I’m nervously anticipating his rebuttal blog post, though.)
3) I know troll commenter Kimbo personally. Don’t let him annoy you, his ego would explode and that would be a pain to clean up ;D

I’m acting out of character a lot lately. First a whiny post. Now I’m going to go into guild-related specifics, using a pretty harsh tone. Before you know it, I’ll be making posts about Paladin Cataclysm changes. Ok, maybe that’s pushing it. But anyway, an interesting situation in guild came up recently and I found it worth talking about.

The Story, part 1: How it all started.

On my guild’s application template, there’s a “tell us a joke” section. It’s a rather brilliant idea and tells you a lot about an applicant’s personality. Most applicants tell really lame jokes, but end up being ok people, just not very funny. This one kid, though, had “woman’s rights” as his joke.

While I wouldn’t qualify that as exactly offensive, I had to roll my eyes. Real mature there, kiddo, real mature.

When one of the officers replied with “invited because of joke“, I still wasn’t offended quite yet but was getting a little annoyed. After all, my eyes were becoming sore from all the rolling they were doing.

Things got a little heated when our kickass (female) bear tank cocked an eyebrow. The kid replied with a sarcastic remark. Having enough, I jumped in with a sarcastic remark of my own, pointing out how he was really impressing the women in the guild.

His answer? “Oh yeah, that’s what I play WoW for, to impress women.”

Is that a challenge, little boy? Are you challenging me? I accept your challenge little boy.

I wanted to take him on then and there, but instead I bit my tongue and left a note for my GM.

Let’s play Find-the-Line

Our guild chat is rated well beyond PG-13. Racist and pseudo sexist jokes abound but, for the most part, no one is bothered. Why was this particular behaviour unacceptable to me? Where’s the line?

The line is different from one person to the next. When it comes to sexist jokes especially, tolerance levels vary from woman to woman. A woman who grew up in a sexist environment and who had to fight her whole life to be listened to and respected will probably find nothing funny in sexist jokes. A woman who grew up in a sexist environment and who accepted it as part of life will probably be pretty difficult to offend. A woman who, and I fall into this category, grew up in a female dominated world and sort of takes respect and equality for granted will be somewhere in the middle.

What about this behaviour crossed my line?

1- All I knew about this guy’s personality was negative. The main reason none of the other guys’ pseudo sexist remarks bother me is because I’ve either had normal, enjoyable conversations with those guys in private, or I’ve had strange, irrational conversations with those guys in private, which had them excused as “raving lunatics, not responsible for their words”. All I had seen from this applicant was a very lame attempt at humour and blatant disrespect towards myself and another guildy. Not even good enough to be lumped into the “raving lunatic” category.

2- He didn’t know when to stop. When in doubt, don’t take chances. My guildy and I were subtle in our warnings, but when you have two women, strangers, coming at you with displeased tones after you showed some sexist attitude, you’ll want to test the waters before adding fuel to the fire. Not knowing when to stop is a red flag.

3- An application thread is supposed to impress. When I read an application thread, I see it as the best this person has to offer. This is them selling themselves, trying to impress their future guildies. Obviously, the best this guy has to offer is pretty crappy.

4- The timing was bad. Pseudo sexism was getting stale. We were in the middle of a roster turnover. I was burned out and sick IRL. Sure, he couldn’t have known that this was not the time act like a moron, but when you don’t know what kind of group of people you’re talking to, you should play it safe. Social skills 101.

The Story, part 2: It only get better!

Here’s where things take a strange turn. Our 10 man runs are organized on our offnights. One team runs on Wednesday and one team (my team) runs on Sunday. The kid signed up for Wednesdays’ 10 man. Guess who leads the Wednesday team? Heh. All I can say is that she was far more polite than I would ever be in explaining to him that 10 man teams require a certain level of respect and maturity, qualities he would need to display in order to be considered for a spot. (I would have just flat out told him I have a no asshole policy. In my opinion, he was beyond redemption. He could go die in a fire. Like I let him do several times during Tuesday’s raid.)

Here’s a condensed version of the exchange that followed:

Kid: The GM said I could put smilies when I’m being sarcastic to show I’m joking.Me: It’s obvious when you’re joking, it’s the nature itself of your joking that’s unacceptable.GM: Well, what else is he supposed to do?Me: Usually when you offend someone without meaning to, you apologize.

He did privately apologize to our bear tank. I asked for an apology as well. I didn’t receive one, but I can’t say I was too surprised. After all, he doesn’t need anything from me. (That he knows of.)

Now tells us what you learned…

Did I handle the situation as well as I could have?

No. Of course not.

Honestly, and I know it’s strange, I’ve never encountered this sort of thing before. Ever since my childhood, I’ve been in female dominated environments. Grade school, high school, college, my psych undergrad, pharmacy school, every job I’ve had, the females outnumbered the guys by a lot. Among my siblings, I was the only girl, but I was the oldest and the strongest, so it was a non-issue. I’ve never really had to stand up for myself as a woman. Even in WoW, my old guild was mainly composed of thirtysomething, highly educated, upper middle class, working professionals. Anyone who displayed immaturity in an application was turned away and anyone who offended guildies during their trial period was given a swift /gkick with very little discussion.

When dealing with the pseudo sexism of guild chat, dispelling the joking with more joking usually works pretty well. If I get a “yes, mom” from a guildy I happen to be scolding, I’ll play along, asking if he’s eaten his vegetables. If a conversation takes a turn for worst, a snarky comment of a warning will generally get the other person to back off.

This guy was either utterly clueless, or had no regard for others whatsoever. Either way, it’s very difficult for me to respect such a person. I don’t want to raid with him, I don’t want him in guild chat. The fact that I’m even blogging about this shows a lot.

Still, I recognize that being direct is the way to go for these situations. To me, it’s obvious that you should apologize when your attitude offends. But apparently it isn’t obvious to everyone. Or instead of making a sarcastic remark when he crossed my line, I should have flat out told him on the spot that his behaviour wasn’t cool and that I’d like for him to change his attitude. Would it have made a difference? Maybe not, but he wouldn’t have been able to use “I didn’t know any better” as an excuse.

The “Panties in a Wad” Fear

A large reason that I get nervous about flat out telling people they’re going too far is the “Panties in a Wad” fear. Basically being accused of exaggerating or blowing things out of proportion. The second us girls disagree, it’s “OMG, drama!”, “OMG hissy fit!”, “You must be PMSing!”. This is how we’re taught from a young age to not speak up. Enraging, yes, but once the message sinks in, it’s difficult to unlearn. So we communicate with hints, until we reach our breaking point and it all comes rushing out, reinforcing the notion of women throwing hissy fits and starting drama.

Is the “Panties in a Wad” fear justified? Probably not. Especially not in this guild where, despite our huge member diversity, people are pretty accepting of each other’s limits. Actually, I didn’t even realize how ingrained my panties in a wad fear was until I scolded this kid on the forums and immediately wanted to crawl under the floor afterward.

Moving Forward!

I am looking forward to seeing how this is going to play out. At this point, I’m more entertained than anything else. It’s hard to stay offended given the hilarity of the situation. Still, should the question be asked, I plan on enforcing a “no asshole” policy for my 10 mans. I am going to focus on being direct (I’m sure my guildies will loooooooove this, hahaha) and I’m going to work on getting rid of my panties in a wad fear. I hope for many panties in a wad accusations following this post so I can practice not caring.

110 Comments on “The New Recruit or How I Almost Got in a Fight with a Sexist Jerk”

On my guild app, we ask for the applicant’s opinion on the quote, “Girls don’t play WoW.” It helps immensely in judging personality fit into the guild, as personality (and fitting in comfortably with the guild) is one of the most important things we judge our applicants on.

That’s an interesting guild app question, I don’t think I’ve seen that one before.

I can’t say poor personality is something I come across a lot- what I described in this post was really a one-time occurrence. And when I said that in my old guild, offending others during your trial period resulted in a /gkick, I can only recall that happening twice in the two years I was there. I like to think that the majority of WoW players are great people, but every now and again you run into some who are really lacking in the social skills department. It’s surprising how much effect the bad apples can have though.

For me, it’s the fear of being “that girl”. The oversensitive, uses her tits to get ahead, whiny, panties in a wad girl… that shouldn’t fucking matter.

I’m an *excellent* holy paladin, by golly. I’m the best healer in my guild, I’ve been friends with all of my fellow officers for years, our GL has been a favored coworker of mine for 7 years, and my boyfriend is in our guild because *I* invited him.

And I still worry that people are going to misinterpret a vaguely sexual joke, or mild innuendo and assume that I’m vapid, useless, and don’t know how to play, and the only reason I get to raid is because my boyfriend is a good DK.

It’s total bullshit. If anything, HE gets to raid because *I’M* awesome — melee dps is, of course, a dime a dozen. But it doesn’t stop the fear of being put down because I’m a chick.

*sigh*

It’s the same reason I get over-defensive at work when someone starts telling me how to do something I know how to do. Partially because I’m a know it all, but partially because I’m horrified at the idea that people think I don’t know something I should know just cuz I’m a girl. Which isn’t the intention at all, but … well, you try being the only girl in the office. 🙂

I feel like that all time too. Not too much in real life because I’m usually in female-heavy environments, but in game, all the time. With my guild, I’m not that cautious anymore. I think everyone knows me well enough by now, but it took me a long time warm up to the guys because I worried that I’d be mistaken for flirting or attention whoring. I was worried about screwing up because I was afraid of “she screwed up because she’s a girl”.

I’ve noticed that I’m far more critical of other women than I am of the guys because of this. When a guy does something stupid or is a bad player, I go “whatever”. When a girl does something stupid or is a bad player, I’m all “YOU’RE BETRAYING YOUR GENDER!!!!”

“Kid: The GM said I could put smilies when I’m being sarcastic to show I’m joking.”

Ok this drives me nuts when people do it, in general. When people are talking colloquially, they start the sentence with “no offense but” and think that the statement is no longer offensive because of that preface. In game it’s with a smiley, “j/k”, or “lol”. Just because someone says “lol” after it, that doesn’t make the joke appropriate.

“No offense but” or “lol” are not jedi mind tricks which will make the audience receptive to the dumb statement. The underlying statement is still offensive. Period.

I’ve always found the “no offense” opening to be annoying as well. If you’re saying something offensive, you’re obviously meaning offense. There are times where pointing out that something’s a joke is helpful, some kinds of teasing for example, but when an offensive statement is obviously a joke, pointing out it’s jokeness doesn’t change anything.

The way I think is the more people react to whatever totally outrageous things that come out of my mouth the more liable they are to crack under ANY kind of pressure

Yes I use it as a tool to judge people’s states of mind

Now the way to look at that app is HE WASNT DIRECTING HIS COMMENT AT YOU

But for some reason some people feel the need to take those things and shove them in some kind of personal vault of retribution. They charge into online battles defending some sort of personal code of conduct.

No one should have to put up with comments or attitudes from guildies that makes them unhappy or uncomfortable. End of story. Sometimes winning the battle means taking your toys and playing elsewhere (which in this situation would be highly exaggerated) but everyone’s entitled to a level of respect, internet or not internet.

Edit: As a correction, it wasn’t the app itself that was a problem, but the attitude that followed. And if someone’s attitude is pissing people off right from the start, it’s all downhill from there.

I think your confused as to what people’s expectations of gaming are. If Social gatherings following some kind standards you seem to already have set forth are your thing then maybe you need to play The Sims. But I think alot of gamers want to succeed and sometimes Arrogant pricks are exactly what you need

There are different kinds and levels of respect. (And as a side note, I’m surprised that I haven’t been called a hypocrite yet since this whole blog post was pretty disrespectful)

To be respected as a gamer, play well.

Being respected as a person is different. I see more that everyone is entitled to a certain level at first, and that level increases or decreases based on an individual’s behaviours.

Some people do react more strongly than others, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but they would have to choose the people they associate with more carefully. If someone doesn’t tolerate, say, swearing and applied to be part of a guild where swearing is commonplace, I would think they picked the wrong guild.

The same people inhabit the internet as the rest of the planet. To say that something is acceptable on the internet because it’s the internet is an artificial distinction. The undesirable behavior may be more PREVALENT, but it doesn’t make it OK.

Hi, I’m a girl, and I’m going to wade into this one with a baseball bat. (sorry oph, but this person is acting like a privileged male, using all the things you pointed out as being a problem… with all due respect indeed!)

“Now the way to look at that app is HE WASNT DIRECTING HIS COMMENT AT YOU”

WRONG!

That application was aimed at everyone in the guild. So yes, oph was completely within her rights to be offended (but like she points out, it was more a warning bell at that pointed to attitude later on). It wasn’t written on a public forum like reddit or digg (even then she is perfectly legitimate in her opinion of being offended), it was in a place she considers to be home.

This doesn’t seem unreasonable, Oph in fact has appeared to have been very circumspect in her behaviour and attitude – almost to the point of propgating the issue (knickers in a knot comment). And she is 100% on the money with all her observations in this. I bet every female gamer has had this experience. And you know what? It’s NOT ok that we feel we need to put up with it.

So, you are wrong. Your idea of baiting people to see how they react? That is just ridiculous and completely unnecessary! How someone reacts to OFFENSE is no where near the same way as to how they deal with pressure. Your arrogance with that statement is unbelieveable!

It is all about privilege. Go read up on it if you have no idea what I am talking about, there are people out there who write far more knowledgeably than I ever could on the topic.

I had to chuckle a bit, Kimbo’s arrogance is running gag in our guild. I should probably put up a disclaimer that Kimbo and I know each other beyond the blog, he was my guild’s raid leader until recently. It sets a different context to his words. He tries to cross the line, but he has yet to succeed in pissing me off 😉

You won, grats Kimbo 😉 You can have the internets back! I was trolled 😀

However, back to the topic: Intent is everything! I assume Kimbo does not actually believe most of what he typed, he was just trolling Oph (unbenknownst to us) but if he actually does, then all my comments stand.

Problem is, I have seen this far too many times FOR REAL and am currently struggling with exactly this situation in my current guild, except the sexist undertones are very much overtones and I am trying to find the line of where I can butt in (as relatively new) and say “hey, not cool, people!”

Kimbo very ably played the privileged male gamer and how they react and think. It happens a lot, and it’s something I feel pretty passionate about (as you can tell).

And yep, again Oph has me writing a new post in my head for my blog (I actually have 2 EEP! as well as LK on the go!)

Oh, he was hard leader for sure and he means what he’s saying, but in context, it’s not as bad as it looks. Rest assured that I like that he brings a different point of view to discussions and I enjoy his comments, as long as my readers don’t get too upset by them.

” Your idea of baiting people to see how they react? That is just ridiculous and completely unnecessary! How someone reacts to OFFENSE is nowhere near the same way as to how they deal with pressure. ”

Right on. That attitude always annoys me. I need to know how people react to pressure alright. And what I need to know is that if people in the guild are under pressure is that person a jerk that is going to poke and prod and make it worse. I don’t need any part of that. They can justify it anyway they want but most of those sort are just doing it to make people mad because it gives them a twisted sense of empowerment. I am not fond of oversensitivity either, but I would rather not be around people that get their jollies off of making others unhappy.

I would rather hang out with thick skinned types that just don’t take offense and like joking around. But that sort usually don’t do it to make people mad. They do it for fun and friendship. That is the sort I need around. Not the sort that is hanging out with a can of gasoline to pore on the slightest tendril of drama smoke.

Yeah, that’s an app we would have turned down straight away. We like to joke around, but the whole point is that we are able to joke around because people have the social skills and basic respect in place to understand where the frigging lines are. Part of the purpose of sarcasm and “edgy” joking in the first place is social cohesion; people who get it wrong not only set themselves apart, they ruin it for the rest. Exclusive? Maybe. I really couldn’t give a damn, I’m in a guild because it’s a social environment I enjoy working in.

I have yet to have anything like a good experience with anyone whose idea of “best foot forward” was a challenge to find them offensive.

Eggshells? t’hee. I’ve spent my life offending people, usually inadvertently, at which point I generally apologize for it unless I really do think it was a case of seriously tender skin.

There is a huge, massive difference between not trying hard to be inoffensive and going out of your way to offend, which is what using a generic guild application to insult a group and then being deliberately rude to members of that group in a guild (which again, you applied to work within) to see how they’ll react. You’ll note just about everyone else in the thread remarking on the huge difference between “edgy” jokes with people you know versus people you don’t.

Every offense intended, you sound like you have problems with “the line” yourself- especially as you’ve gone out of your way to tell someone else how they should feel and not to fight “battles” on the internet.

When a really close friend makes a sexist joke ironically, I’ll smirk alongside him because I know he doesn’t think that way and it’s just between us. When someone I don’t know makes the jokes to me, then it’s not so good. When someone who I only know a little makes those jokes in a public space, I don’t like it.

I think very few raiding guilds are full of people that you can know well enough to make -ist jokes if you’re being ironic. And even being ironic, it’s not okay with me 99% of the time.

It’s terribly hard to offend me, but having a recruit act like that is far from impressive and not something that should be tolerated. There’s a huge difference between making those kind of jokes among people you know and complete strangers. I would have called him out just on principle.

I make a large distinction between people I know and strangers as well. One of my guildies has taken to teasing me about being psycho. I love it! I find it really funny and endearing. If a stranger acted like that, though, I’d be pretty pissed off.

1) The new guy is trying too hard and isn’t socially adept enough to realize that instead of “fitting in” he’s being obnoxious.

2) That’s just how he is and either

2a)the officers will decide not to tolerate it and kick him once they’ve found a replacement or

2b) you’ll lose guild members over it because the new guy changed the social dynamics of the guild in a negative way.

“1” is fairly easy to deal with as a conversation from an officer and time in guild tends to smooth this out.

“2” is trickier because if the officers aren’t vigilant in keeping an eye on the atmosphere of the guild, you can lose valuable members over the new guy if it’s perceived that that kind of behaviour is acceptable. And losing more people when you’re already dealing with attrition sucks.

If the new guy keeps it up, a whisper that it’s offensive might curb it. But if it doesn’t and he’s non-essential, put him on /ignore.

Especially if he happens to come across this blog post. I’m not exactly shy about my blog.

I think he’ll either keep to himself or eventually leave on his own. My guild is a tough bunch and pretty tolerant of those with less social skills, so I’d be surprised if any real frustrations result of this but I can’t see him really fitting in either. Unless he suddenly wants to raid with my Sunday team (HAHAHAHA), I don’t really have any reason to associate with him so I think any kind of tension between him and I is pretty much resolved.

As you know the people, maybe you know something I don’t, but the thing that disturbs me most about your story is the officer who posted “invited because of your joke”.

It’s one thing to let that behavior slide, and quite another for it to be encouraged from the guild leadership.

If I were a relatively new member of your guild and saw that, I’d probably gquit on the spot if I didn’t get the right response from a GM or the person who wrote that when I challenged them on it.

Ophelie, I would distinguish your concern about being offended easily from a concern about being “that chick” who gets everything handed to her by drooling fratboys because she has breastesses. In my experience, the latter *thrives* in guilds where sexist comments are rampant and offensive, and is the least likely to get upset about them. Her currency is the sugar-tit she doles out to guys who don’t know how to deal with women.

If you’re even contemplating challenging a sexist statement in anything by the most submissive way possible, you are at the polar opposite end of the spectrum from “that chick”, trust me.

In my opinion, people who step into a social situation for the first time and lead with sarcastic, clearly derogatory humor are either extremely self-absorbed and want attention, or very social inept (I’m hoping in your Kid’s case is just the latter). First impressions are valuable. If all you know about someone is that they made an irritating joke, then that is all you have to attribute to their personality. Some guilds are all business and don’t care about personality, but it sounds like yours does. It doesn’t sound like your problem is with the joke – its with the fact that that is what he wanted his first impression to be.

Interacting on the internet is still interacting with other people, it doesn’t automatically dissolve all social conventions. You can be respectful to others without walking on eggshells, its not an all-or-nothing scenario. Sure you might not care about what some random person on the street thinks of you, but if you’re trying to join a team in which you will be working closely with others and depending on them, you probably should care when you upset them.

As you can see in my other comments, I completely understand where you are coming from. In this case, I think it is fair to figure out what this kid is on about – is he oblivious/acting privileged? in which case, you should point it out to him and give him a chance to improve his behaviour. Kids (I assume he is mid/early teens from your term for him) need to learn from somewhere, and as much as it wearies me repeating myself over and over (eg “please dont talk about rape, you don’t know who has been and are quietly upset now because they cant talk about it” I feel like a broken record in my guild sometimes) I think it is important to do.

I’m going to try not to just repeat my early comments about women in WoW. I trust you remember. Plus, I generally don’t like repeating myself.

I used to reguarly make the mistake of trying to rationally examine irrational behavior in an attempt to better understand it, but I’ve since learned the folly of that.

There’s a world of difference between making an off-color joke (however ill-advised or poorly executed it may be), and making ad hominem attacks or sweeping generalizations for the purpose of insulting a person or group of people, being popular, filling the void of the emptiness of one’s existence, etc. I don’t fault you for reacting the way that you did. This was something that affected you, and you had the right to confront him about it. To rebuke him, to try and understand the “why” of it, whatever.

I’m not trying to be P.C. I’m not trying to desperately avoid offending anyone. But I understand the difference between being “P.C.” (bad, in my opinion), and being respectful (good). I’m male. I don’t want anyone to judge me based on things that I haven’t done, or the coin flip of whether the sperm that helped make me carried an X or a Y. So why in the hell would I do that to someone else?

It’s something that seems so crystal clear to me, and it’s difficult for me to understand why anyone would want to go out of their way to deliberately tweak someone else in such a manner. Perhaps he seeks attention, any attention, and a negative reaction is certainly attention. It’s impossible for me to know.

As cliche as it may sound, I’ve met some incredible ladies that play WoW. I know a couple of women who play healers and are so good at it that I’m spoiled. I don’t like Tanking anything on my Death Knight if one of them isn’t coming along. It has nothing to do with their chromosomes and everything to do with their skill. A few nights ago one of them said that I was sweeter than most guys she’s met, in real life or in WoW. As flattered as I was, I was also saddened to learn that this wonderful person has experienced such negativity. (Even if I don’t know specifics. It’s none of my business, after all.)

And you really shouldn’t worry about “getting your panties in a wad”; at least around people like I. It’s just a way of dismissing legitimate criticism. Anger is anger. Man or woman, everyone has the right to express it, to vent, to rage. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to differentiate the wheat from the chaff as far as legit complaining goes.

Wow, that was a long comment. I’m sorry. I hope I remembered to say everything that I wanted to. But before I go (and to lighten the mood a little), I’ll add that the times when I’m LEAST funny is when I’m prompted to tell a joke. I’m at my best at humor when I’m playing off something else. >.<

There is a difference, however, between over-reacting in defense of your own short comings and reacting to -ist comments.

I agree, those that arc up are often wary of arse covering when they screw up (I am aware I do this sometimes, and make massive efforts to pull MYSELF up when I screw up, which, thankfully, is not too often), but that is a straw man to the issue at hand.

There is a difference, however, between over-reacting in defense of your own short comings and reacting to -ist comments.

I agree, those that arc up are often wary of arse covering when they screw up (I am aware I do this sometimes, and make massive efforts to pull MYSELF up when I screw up, which, thankfully, is not too often), but that is a straw man to the issue at hand.
(apologies if this posts twice, proxy being weird)

One can completely turn that around and say that those who act like assholes do so because they aren’t confident in their abilities and overcompensate by putting everyone else down.

If someone gets overly sensitive after being yelled at in a raid, there’s a small, slight chance they’re covering their arse. But confrontations over social skills that go on outside of raids have nothing to do with the game itself.

Sometimes it may feel a bit silly to fight hard for respect from sexist boys or men in a virtual world where our main goal is to kill abominations and vampires and dragons – but hopefully, it will have an impact on gender equality for those guys outside of the game as well. I try to keep perspective on that when I’m feeling overwhelmed by the rampant sexism in trade chat or guild chat or wherever.

I don’t see WoW as a medium of social change, I would prefer to make a difference in the real world and have that reflect on WoW (ambitious, I know!).

When someone is a jerk to me in game (be it over sexist stuff or just a jerk in general), I just think, “hey…wait a minute..you can’t talk to me like that”.

Trade chat usually doesn’t bother me, unless I see a really young girl getting torn apart, then I feel sad. But I see it more as, if you don’t like it, don’t read it. I had trade turned off on my old server because it was just unbearable.

When guild chat gets bad, I tend to ignore that too. (or I just laugh at how silly everyone looks. Threads on the forums about social issues are pretty funny too since there are only about 4 people in the guild who really know how to argue, everyone else is just making a fool of themselves) I rarely find guild chat crosses the line, though.

I may have raised an eyebrow or two on that app (and outright giggled when I saw him sign up for the 10-man). Sexism? Okay, whatever. I’m used to it.

Your application to a guild should be you making the effort to put a good foot forward, and the attitude displayed in that particular one was… well. It rubbed me the wrong way a bit. Still, if he’s apologized to Bear and is otherwise being a semi-decent human being, then he won’t bother me (and that’s what the Vent mute button is for, if it’s really bad).

I know how much your organization side love when I post my comments in list form, so why stop the trend now.

1.) I’m sure a lot of us appreciate these type of “behind the curtain” posts. Sure, you always have a relatable tone on your blog, but sometimes that can be a bitter of a veneer still. Hooray for honesty.
2.) You lied. You clearly don’t have a “no assholes” rule; you let me come. (or maybe that’s why I’m “very lucky”…hmmm..)
3.) Business teaches us that a new acquisition that drains resources from previously profitable holdings without exceeding said profits is a bad acquisition.
4.) Every time I’ve been an RL or GM, my groups were close to 50% female and usually the women outplayed the men. Personally I reveled in this because I knew it drove the pseudo-macho crowd nuts. Then again, I like to date smart women that can stand up to me, so maybe it was just a carry-over of my personality preferences.
5.) “aww…that’s cute”

1) Hahaha. I did wonder a little bit how you guys would all react to me posting this. I debated whether or not to hit the publish button and decided to go with using the “if you don’t want to be called out as an asshat, don’t be an asshat” philosophy.

2) Ah, I didn’t really, just lacked a sense of observation and didn’t notice your assholish qualities. I can deny your invitation if you want.

3)Um, yeah, that sounds about right.

4) I’ve always played with more men than women, but they tend to be the modern, open minded men. I secretly like really dominating men with more personality than me, men I can really fight with, but those kind of men don’t like me. Something about too much effort and high maintenance and blablabla.

I wonder if you can tell from this comment thread who that officer was ^_^.

Yeah, I wasn’t impressed with the reinforcement and I don’t think I would have been bothered by the whole situation if I hadn’t seen it be cheered on by the leadership. I didn’t complain too loudly about this because I could see it reflected some other things going on behind the scenes. Things that, as far as I know, are now resolved.

I was waiting to see if this topic was going to pop up over here. As one of the women of the guild I wasn’t bothered by his application joke but I fall into the “…woman who grew up in a sexist environment and who accepted it as part of life will probably be pretty difficult to offend” category.

I saw the exchange going on in the thread and that’s where he crossed the line for me. MY guildie was offended, not one of them, but two! And two of MY friends! And that’s where my feeling of being the protective big sister comes from. Protection over MY guildmates… if THEY are offended, it offends me. It automatically put him on the shit list for me.

I am amazed that Fungi accepted him into her group, it showed me that she IS perfectly mature enough to handle the situation and move on. She expressed herself and handled it well.

Kimbo is just Kimbo and that’s the way it is… Although I definitely agree with Brangwin when she said, “How someone reacts to OFFENSE is no where near the same way as to how they deal with pressure.” The two are just simply not related in any way.

Thanks for making this an open discussion Ophelie. I enjoy reading everyone’s comments and it certainly does give you a place to vent! 😀

I'm glad you enjoyed the discussion. Guild topics (even the nice ones) are always touchy, but they're the ones I like to talk about most.

I see offense and pressure as two distinct concepts too. Context makes a difference on how things are perceived as well. When I was working the night shifts at Tim Hortons, I’d have drunks throw stuff at me and threaten to kill me all the time and it didn’t phase me in the slightest. But I wouldn’t let that go over at all in my personal life. At my summer job working with special needs kids and teenagers, I’d sometimes get my arse handed me. One bad beating left me with a bloody face, a broken finger and bald spots where my hair was ripped out. I asked for a different assignment after that, but otherwise I handled it fine, just picked myself up and kept working. Now had a boyfriend beaten me like that, it would have been the end of the world.

I went to grad school for computer science. Talk about a more-male-dominated-than-WOW environment… I think what bugs women in such situations is the assumption that we have to prove ourselves to be ok despite the fact that we’re women. That we’re not “that girl who waves her hair and boobs around and gets gear”. Or “the one who flirts with the professor for As” or “who sleeps her way to her next promotion”. It’s not particularly fair to us that we are assumed guilty til proven innocent.

I always found the best way to handle it was to ignore the assumption that girls must suck/be emotionally unstable/need hand holding. A lot of the time it turns out the jerkiest guys are actually jealous – either because they can’t get a girl to talk to them, or because the one they do have won’t play WoW with them. (My husband gets more “Whoa, I wish my wife would play WoW with me” comments than we can shake a stick at)

File me in the “hard to offend” category but that still doesn’t mean I enjoy being around people who seem to think I’m a lesser human.

After thinking it over, it’s less the sexist jokes that offend me than someone acting rude to me, regardless if it’s about gender or otherwise. It’s the “hey, don’t talk to me like that”

It’s just a lot easier to call someone out on behaviour that would be perceived as rude by anyone. Gender related bad behaviour is way more subjective and open to interpretation.

I do worry a lot when I’m around new guys (and even some new women, other women in WoW can be more vicious than the men) that, yes, every mistake or dumb comment or display of emotion will be seen as “OMG ITS A CRAZY CHICK/ATTENTION WHORE”. Unfounded fear for sure, but I don’t know how to get rid of it.

Hopefully it won’t come to that! Since I scolded him on the forums, he’s been pretty quiet. I’ve had a few talks with the GM over this and I know the officers are watching him (and they’ve seen this blog post), so I’m not worried that someone will step in if things take a turn for the worst.

You know, I was thinking the same thing about publishing as well. I won’t try to defend the actions of my leadership crew, but there are times when I have to compromise my principles. Even Google did business with China for a time. When my guild’s in need of bodies to raid, I have to temporarily put them on the side because the focus is to raid. I’m just like most GMs. I have to turn to the forums, trade chat and so forth to make sure I have bodies to raid. It’s a never ending process of recruit, pare down, recruit, pare down, etc. As much as I’d LIKE to have a guild of respect, mature, skilled players who are constantly excited and enthusiastic to raid, I am not that deluded. People will always come and go. My priority is to make sure we have a full sized roster for raids. Sure recruits get off on the wrong foot. Some people say the wrong things at the wrong time. I’m willing to give them a second or third chance, depending on how recruiting is going. Sometimes people change, sometimes they don’t. You never really get to know a person until you raid with them for a month.

I will say this though. At the rate of trash and unnecessary deaths, regardless of his numbers, I can assure you that sexist comments won’t be the first reason that comes to mind for guild dismissal.

“might not know what you’re getting yourself into”…. sounds like a Crying Game in the works.

To offer a constructive point along the lines of what Matt said, I would expect that all raid regulars be concerned primarily with raid output, not forum one-liners. Without excusing anything, we should all be able to dismiss attention-grabbing attempts on the forums and ridicule/hate people based on their in-game efforts alone. After all, we survived Arch. LOL

I wouldn’t put up with someone being a jerk to me on the forums or in guild chat (and that is what I’m criticizing- not a one liner on the forums) and I don’t care what his dps is, I wouldn’t let him in my 10 man or run 5 mans. What goes on in 25 mans/ginvites or whatever isn’t my problem, but I have the right to set limits as to how I’m treated and I have the right say “you can’t talk to me like that” if someone is crossing the line.

I know the point of “should someone with a poor taste joke in an app be invited” came up in comments (and I did mention something about it in the post itself, but my old guild and Conquest are completely different environments and shouldn’t be compared), but it’s not the issue at hand. Getting into a discussion about that would require a whole new blog post because I can’t fit all my thoughts in a single comment.

I definitely don’t envy you at all. You have a sucky job for sure and no matter how hard you work, there’s always someone whining. And sometimes that whiner happens to be someone who likes to talk about certain topics on her blog.

I do think that you, personally, handled things really well, especially given all the crap that was going on at the same time. I kept the tone of the post focused on myself since this is a personal reflective post, not me trying to suck up. When it comes to writing about guild stuff involving the leadership, I actually find it trickier to be complimentary than to be whiny because nice stuff gets interpreted as “sucking up” or, when it concerns you specifically, fangirlism, while negative stuff gets shrugged off as “venting”.

Wow, you have a million comments. You know what pisses me off? That you worry more about being OFFENDED than he does at being OFFENSIVE. I understand the need for a fair bit of tolerance on the internet (though I personally have trouble giving it) and occasionally people will make jokes that cross a few personal lines BUT ultimately it doesn’t matter *what* causes the offence, or if you want to debate whether the offence is justified, ultimately you also have to accept that, as you say, it’s entirely subjective and it is NOT OKAY to go around offending people.

I have to say, if this sort of thing had anything to do with me, that kid would have got one hell of a strict talking to and, with no improvement, a swift gkick. I wouldn’t be telling him to put smileys on the end of his sentences.

I think I just worry a lot in general ^_^. I also really enjoy reflecting about things. Everyone’s all “oh you must be so upset if you wrote 1500 words about this”, but, no, not necessarily. I actually had fun writing this post and responding to all the comments.

“ultimately you also have to accept that, as you say, it’s entirely subjective and it is NOT OKAY to go around offending people”

You managed to sum up in one line what I’m been trying to teach myself. When something bothers me, I get so hung up on whether or not it’s ok to be bothered that a simple issue that could be solved by a quick “STFU” gets dragged waaaaay out.

Socially, you’re simply on dangerous ground stereotyping any group that you aren’t a member of.

Just because some black guy laughed or ignored it, doesn’t mean your joke wasn’t offensive. It might just not have been worth it to him to challenge you on it. Or maybe that particular person did find it funny and socially acceptable, but they are not the OfficialSpokespersonForAllBlackPeople[tm].

There really is a great deal more room to have funny/edgy chat without ever going *close* to the racist or sexist (or whatever-ist) line than is dreamt of the universe of the average fratboy wowhead.

That’s true. But for some people, in some contexts stereotype jokes *can* be funny. I enjoy them, but the context has to be right. I’m fine with being teased by friends about PMS or being blonde or whatever, but if someone I don’t know or don’t like does it? Isshhh.

Also it depends on my mood that day. My guildies like to tease me about my bad tanking. Sometimes its funny, other days I’m quick to shut them up.

So wait, you tolerate racist jokes but are offended by sexist comments? you are offended by his jokes probably because you are on the receiving end with sexist remarks but racist jokes are OK since they are not aimed at your group (race)?. That says a lot right there.

It’s all about personal perception. Sexist comments aren’t bad if the people at the receiving end are fine with them. Just like racist jokes are wrong if the person targeted isn’t laughing. When it comes to words, there’s no universal right or wrong.

Also, as a correction, I wasn’t offended by a comment, but by rude behavior that followed.

No offense but (I had to say that), your GM sounds like an idiot. Noatter how many lols 🙂 :)) or jk, sexism is not funny. The kid is a bomb waiting to happen and your GM needs to get a clue. I don’t know your GM, but by the post, that is not how a GM backs up a vetern guildy. The kid should get a stern warning and be told to cut the crap.

Oh, don’t worry, (with the exception of the smilie thing) my GM did a fine job of handling the situation. I left out a lot of details because this is a post about me and not about my GM, but he did warn the kid after I complained and he was supportive of me.

I think the new guy is an immature twit for just diving into being an ass without probing the target audience first, a sure sign of immaturity and one that I indulge in a bit too much.

I think the GM should have given the offending part a swift and fair reprimand rather than telling them to essentially stick a smiley sticker on a bag of shit before they toss it at someone’s head to make it okay.

I think the ones offended by his jokes–which, in all honesty, can be funny in the right circumstance a la Ron Burgundy–that reacted poorly are silly for poking them with the pointy stick of sarcasm and expecting them to realize the error of their ways rather than get defensive about it.

I don’t particularly understand or empathize with the “I’m a girl so I can’t make any mistakes or be upset otherwise all the manly men will judge me negatively” thing because, 1. I’m a dude. I really can’t. 2. I don’t look at whether someone is male or female or any other useless thing when I wonder if they’re being retarded or not. An overreaction is an overreaction to me–regardless of the person overreacting.

I think that people (male and female alike) take things a little too seriously sometimes. I highly doubt his motive behind being an ass was to specifically offend anyone. I have yet to know any women that I thought were “lol being a girl” when they were upset. I think that the generalization that males in general think that is absurd and ridiculous. Not everyone’s experiences are going to be the same as my own, but by and large, in our generation, those particular stigmas don’t exist as much as they have before.

I did write this more as a personal reflection than anything else. Problem with blogging is that personal reflections become public reflections. I’m sure everyone in the guild would have forgotten about the whole thing had I not written a crazy long blog post about it, then debated it in the comments. It’s been an enjoyable discussion, though, so I don’t regret it.

My comment was not to offend the GM. It just sounded like he shrugged it off. As a past GM myself, I know people can have several different stories and different views. I didn’t put up with any racism, sexism, or insulting remarks. My guild was mainly friends and 1/2 women.

Your GM is probably doing great job, but people like “kid” put undue stress on a guild. By the sound of it, he won’t last long anyway.

I actually prefer “bunch” to “wad”. “Wad” sounds kinda gross. This could be very phsychologically revealing….hmmmm…delete or keep it…ah what the hell. Anyhow, I wrote a rant last week about racism, mentioning how often I see that kind of crap on WoW and the truth is it’s never okay. Racist, sexist, whatever. The only opinion that counts is the opinion of the offended person. The offender doesn’t get a vote or an opinion. I vote for beating him senseless with a gnome. Was that an option?

Seems to me this could have been nipped in the bud right at the beginning; instead one of your officers responded with the “Invited because of joke” comment.

That officer is who you should be raging on, rather than the sap who wrote the original comment. Why? because that officer legitimised the slur. He not only said it’s ok to make comments like that, but he reinforced the remark by saying that the comment was good enough to deserve an invite on its own.

Now imagine if that officer or your GM had posted instead “Nice app, but your joke comment was not appreciated”.
That would have been the end of the matter. No surprise the kid felt his point of view was backed by members of your own guild; they are the ones who let him in.

I agree. And I don’t think I would have given the joke a second thought had I not seen cheered on by the leadership.

After getting so many comments and seeing a couple of other bloggers address the topic, I realize that some of the stuff I left out because I judged it unimportant is actually stuff I should have mentionned.

There was a lot going on at the time and I had the impression that the “invited because of joke” reflected some tension going on behind the scenes. Tension that I believe has since been resolved.

I also wasn’t fair to my GM. While he gave horrible advice to the new recruit (eh, we all make mistakes!), he was quick to say “watch it” to the applicant when I complained. I left that out for the sake of brievety and simplicity, but I’m realizing now that I should have included it.

[…] it’s a pretty general post rather than being at all WoW-specific. Original kerffufle found at Ophelie’s and commented further upon by Tam. Since this post was written more with the other site in mind, […]

Most of what can be, has been discussed already I just have always found it interesting the way gender roles and perceptions sit in wow.

What annoys me is that several of my female guildies don’t speak up on vent for fear of being drawn attention to. It’s not that we’re a bunch of sexist chauvinists but their own history of playing in wow. Sure we’ve had our own distinct share of stereotypes (attention starved or terrible players) but I think it’s almost a disservice to the good well adjusted players who feel that they have to lay low. Admittedly one of them jokes that it’s because she doesn’t want Team Virgin wiping the raid because they heard a girl on vent.

I’m sometimes offensive and I’m the first to admit it. If I upset a guildie with a comment I’ll apologise if I think it’s appropriate – I also tend to wait before I introduce people to the banter in vent. Do I feel I have to recognise people’s rights to be offended? Pretty much no, just as they have the right to deem what I’m saying as out of order it’s simple logic that I have the same rights to consider it fine. But that’s a socially inept decision that doesn’t work in a guild. Different stuff offends different people. Someone with particularly thin skin could be a very annoying person to raid with as tempers often run high after a lot of wipes.

Joining a guild with a joke like that? Stupid idea and its a sign of how young he is that he tried to laugh it off with further comments.

I had no time to read all the comment, so maybe someone already said something like that. But through the 4 past months, I’ve been an officer and the only girl in my guild.

And I had to give up the officer position 2 weeks ago because I was never taken seriously and was in serious risk of breaking down. I grew very defensive after a few months and ended up quite aggressive sometimes.

I still wonder what I should have done, how I should have reacted, yada yada… I talked a lot, with my GM first (he’s the one who “asked” me to give up officer position, but him being the boss, he actually took the decision alone.), I talked with another officer, with my boyfriend (who is a guildie too), with other people in SAN who have been extremely supportive (thanks Tam).

I found you post very interesting and insightful actually. I often feel that I need to be better just because I’m a girl, not complaining or raging because someone would ask if I’m “in the bad period”…

And I agree with one of the commenters above who said the officer responding to the application “because of the joke” is quite to blame, because it’s often because other guildies or officers tend to not be careful with that that new people in the guild don’t see (or care) where the line is. They don’t realise that you will accept this joke from a friend because you know him well, but not from strangers…

Stories like that make me so mad. I’ve seen a lot of female GMs and officers report that guys don’t take them as seriously as they should. It’s a real shame, because I find a female officer adds a lot of good to a team. Ours is has been away due to work for a few months and, well, it shows.

It’s especially frustrating that instead of backing you up, your GM just asks you to step down. I would be sooooo furious.

I really liked this post. It’s rare to see you angry, and that lent a lot of weight to your opinion of this person. I think its a unfortunate event of this person making an inappropriate comment, being encouraged by the “Accepted because of joke” remark, and then being confused by the later reaction from you and others. He seems very socially awkward, but stubborn. Usually it takes time for such weird personality flaws to manifest– usually when I’m in a new social situation I try to be as polite as possible until I can gauge how people will react.

I have a TERRIBLE “panties in a wad” fear. The number of times I hear “Wow, that time of the month, huh?” or “Nice Hissy fit.” when I say something about something irksom a friend has done, or a situation that made me upset, is extremely aggrivating. Just because I’m a woman doesn’t mean that I can’t have “negative” feelings about something with out being over emotional, or insane, or a mix of both.

When a former guildy of mine (a young 15 or 16 something boy) asked why I had invited a woman to the guild because “We all agreed that women are to crazy to raid with us” I was extremely upset. We’d had a bad experience with a woman that HAD acted very badly and caused some silly drama, but no where along the line should her actions have caused a universal ban on women in guild. Just because a male guild mate rage-logs in the middle of every other raid, or spams guild chat with annoying hoopla, doesn’t mean that all men are the same and should recieve the mighty stroke of the ban hammer from the guild. I don’t say “No more shaman in raid” because some shaman did something lame and yada-yada-yada. That would be unreasonable. Interesting how that logic doesn’t translate to women players when someone acts poorly. Or, maybe I’ve just got my panties in a twist.